February | 2010 | Traveler on Revenge

*Watch the series before reading

*Paris chapter and Finale is not included here.

NODAME CANTABILE

This is an awesome series. From the manga it got a live drama, movie, and anime. And if youvé watched it you would realize why its been adapted to many things. Its because its so damn awesome.

Story

Its about a guy named Chiaki who wants to become a conductor. One day he meets a unique girl Noda Megumi who plays the piano and that’s how the story starts. The story is well written and showed how Nodame and Chiaki slowly become really great on what they do. It showed progression and development of the characters that you don’t think of them the same way anymore than when you started watching. Now that doesn’t mean that their personality changed but they really where developed.

Story: 97.5 (A+)

Characters

If the story was great, the characters are even better. I LOVE NODAME. She’s just so funny. When partnered with male tsundere Chiaki, they fit so well together. Its also really fun to see that even with that personality on Nodame, she can still play the piano good. My second favorite character is Milch (Stressman) who just makes me laugh my pants off. I wish my conducter ivited us to go party and drink. Chiaki is my third favorite character and first if he was a girl because i LOVE tsunderes. He goes all tsun tsun on Nodame yet he still loves her. I also like Mine and Masumi too though Masumi just plain freaks me out sometimes. Others are also good characters and one of the reasons why Nodame Cantabile is good because all the characters are so likable.

Characters: 100 (A+)

Art/Animation

J.C Staff did a really good job with the animation. The watercolor backgrounds and unique art style just draws you in. At first you may think that the characters look off but when you watch it, it looks so natural. The watercolor backgrounds help in making you feel right at home. The likability of the background helps too after youve watched Honey and Clover which is another JC Staff title. The only thing I don’t like is the CG instruments which look really aweful sometimes though i give them credit for trying hard.

Art/Animation: 90.5 (A-)

Music

Its a given that the music is really good since this is a music series. Actually it exceeded my expectations because besides classical music, they use other types too and it really sounds good. All OP’s/ED’s sound good.